


Nursery Rhymes

by TheBirdBotherer



Category: Dragon Age: Inquisition
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-23
Updated: 2021-02-23
Packaged: 2021-03-13 17:07:28
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 958
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29654526
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheBirdBotherer/pseuds/TheBirdBotherer
Summary: A tender moment shared in secret under the safety of the night, a nursery rhyme to sooth Inquisitor Lavellan.
Relationships: Female Lavellan/Solas
Kudos: 4





	Nursery Rhymes

**Author's Note:**

> written for the lovely sunflower that is Taylor <3

Asteria has never dreamed much, not even as a child. Sleep is oblivion, death in miniature. The apostate beside her certainly had no issues with this. His lidded eyes rolled and twitched, his smile threatening to curl the edges of his lips permanently. Asteria thought it reminded her of a contented house cat.

In her nightdress the colour of bruised plums, the Inquisitor tossed restlessly. The air smelt of torches, metal and whatever the heck Varric was smoking right outside as he took first watch.

She shouldn’t quite quantify what he was to her. Mentor? Friend? Love interest? She did not know, she simply felt like a little girl with a crush on an impossibly unreachable target. She supposed it’s for the best - knowing what they are means that she would know how it would all end. Everything ends. Everyone leaves. This is the truth she knows.

Asteria wonders if this is the moment she would come to regret in the years to come. Reaching forth with an uncertain hand, she traces his exposed clavicle gently. She’d barely known him for a week; but being in a tent with Cassandra meant smelling the magebane potion she carries on her - and being in a tent with Varric meant having to watch where she was going for fear of knocking him over every time she turned around.

Deep in thought, she had failed to consider her hand still lingering over this skin. It was then that a singular brilliant violet eye opens alight, transforming the noble asceticism of her crystalline thoughts into reality. He does not flinch, or reject her, instead bringing his own hand up to caress her fingers gently before shutting his eyes.

“I’m sorry.” She whispered, trying to remove her hand from his.

“We both know this is a lie.” He answers playfully in the same whisper she had given him, moving his hands away from hers but otherwise leaving her hand on his skin.

She drew a circle over his skin with her fingertips, almost grazing his neck.

“What are you doing, Da’len?”

“Nothing..”

“Another lie, you know exactly what you’re doing to me.”

Asteria retracted her hand for real this time, pouting hard. “If you know what I’m doing and you know that I lie, why do you ask?”

“How else will I get to hear your voice?” He answers in a quiet tone, his smile lingering despite his closed eyes. “How else will I see you pout and sulk and pretend you are nothing but an innocent child?”

“I never aspire to innocence.”

“Clearly.” Solas rolls over so he could behold her in his gaze.

“There’s a saying in my clan that if you manage to mark the person you desire, that they may desire you in return.”

“Oh? And do you desire me?”

Asteria thought for a moment, her eyes searching for an answer in his stoic features, all she could focus was the alabaster column of his neck, the sinew and veins under it.

“I’m not sure yet. I need more information before I can decide.” Asteria answers rather plainly. For a moment her thoughts darken, she considered herself simply a placeholder for power, an ornament with no abilities. There was nothing she could offer him that he didn’t already have.

“Well, I’ll be right here when you decide.” Solas shuts his eyes once more, reaching forth to take her hand gently. Holding her marked hand in his, he whispers something into her palm and watched the anchor simmer down and calm, her skin no longer itching. His gaze briefly landed upon the sylvanwood wolf headed ring on her middle finger, pressing a kiss against it gently.

“Do you desire me?” Asteria asked back boldly, preoccupied with the sensation of his skin on hers as she tried to calm her rapid thoughts.

“If you have to ask, you will never know. But if you know.. you need only ask.” He answers rather cryptically, bringing her knuckles up to his lips before giving it a small peck.

“I want you to desire me. But I’m not sure if I desire you yet. Truly, I’m unsure of what we are to one another.” Honesty, unfettered truth left her lips, there was no artifice in the sentiment.

Solas opened his half lidded eyes once more. A short chuckle left his throat, a breath sweeping over her face. She hadn’t noticed how close she had moved to his bedroll. His eyes scanned her features for her thoughts now, despite the darkness he could sense her uncertainty.

_“What big hands you have.”_ She whispers, feeling his entire palm cup her own easily. Asteria finds comfort in the silence between them, there was no urgency, no falseness, no need to impress the other party.

Solas chuckles, as though reciting from memory.

_“All the better to embrace you with.”_ He sang, remembering the nursery rhyme.

Asteria shuts her own eyes now, the memories of her clan elders and stories around the fire rushing back in to calm the storm of uncertainty that lingered.

_“What big eyes you have.”_ She smiled, knowing well he would answer.

_“All the better to see you with.”_ He replied, his smile beaming now.

_“What big ears you have.”_ Asteria chuckled softly, her mind hazing as she began to doze off.

_“All the better to hear you with.”_ Solas answered automatically.

There was a pause, he waited for her to ask the final question.

_“What a big mouth you have.”_ Asteria finally remembers, her thoughts blurring into dream.

Solas does not answer her comment with his own, he did not need to. Like sun on the winter snow, he rolls over to press a kiss against her temple.

_All the better to kiss you with._


End file.
